Interview: CPC's success in transforming China great accomplishment: British sociologist

Visitors review the oath of the Communist Party of China at the Baota Mountain in Yan'an, northwest China's Shaanxi Province, April 25, 2019. (Xinhua/Liu Xiao)

LONDON, March 22 (Xinhua) -- China, led by the Communist Party of China (CPC), is marching toward completely building a moderately prosperous society in all respects this year, which is a great accomplishment, said renowned British sociologist Martin Albrow in a recent interview with Xinhua.

Albrow, currently a fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences in Britain, has visited China many times since 1987.

"The success of the party is really taking China forward, rejuvenating China," he said, adding that the achievement of CPC is a great transformation of the mood of the country.

"We have to look at CPC in relation to the previous hundred years. There were years of, as you say, a century of humiliation. So it's a transformation of the mood of the country. It has created optimism and unity, and those are great achievements in the mood of the country," the scholar said.

According to Albrow, there are three major reasons for CPC's success in transforming China.

First, he is impressed that the CPC has been firmly sticking to the path of socialism with Chinese characteristics, which is an "overriding objective."

"The CPC has maintained this drive to unify Chinese society, and it continues with that," Albrow said.

The other key is, Albrow said, the CPC has been pushing forward implementing the reform and opening-up policy over the past more than 40 years, and adopted a very subtle and pragmatic approach to world relations.

"In particular, they have embraced globalization. They've adopted open policy towards the rest of the world, and the reform policy, which allows foreign companies to invest in China and encourages trade with China, but at the same time protects Chinese property rights and ability to control its own affairs. So it's not unqualified globalization," said Albrow, who is one of the first globalization theorists.

He especially mentioned that being enormously cooperative with other nations and international organizations, like the United Nations and the World Trade Organization, is also a very important part of China's success.

The third reason for the CPC's success lies in its capability, said Albrow, who believes China's fighting against the COVID-19 pandemic is a good example to demonstrate the feature of the CPC governance.

"It shows the Communist Party of China is able to mobilize the country as a whole around single goals," Albrow said.

As far as globalization is concerned, China also gives a good example to the rest of the world, Albrow added.

"I'm thinking of the Belt and Road particularly. This is goal-directed development, not development in accord with some kind of ideological fantasy, not about in taking forms of government anyway. I think it is very appropriate for the current situation," the expert explained.

He said "Belt and Road provides the world with two important examples of how to build a community of shared future. Firstly it shows that technologies cross boundaries. They are the products of human ingenuity and efforts that can benefit all who care to make use of them."

Secondly, "it is the exact opposite to isolation. China and the other nations joining in the Belt and Road agreements are using their sovereign rights and power to work towards goals that all can share and help to meet global challenges that face us all. "

He told Xinhua that the world is facing a "very unsettled environment" due to a number of reasons, one of them is the coronavirus pandemic which "ought to create global unity because it affects everybody, but in fact it has actually created a lot of tensions."

However, he believes China is able to respond to the global situations wisely, as the CPC and Chinese people are "very well equipped because they're very pragmatic and very wise." Enditem